Lucerne

A Hotbed of Revolution

To most Americans "Lucerne" means dairy products from Safeway, but this beautiful city has a wild past going back to the 14th century. Back then, this area was ruled by the Austrian Hapsburg dynasty. Their rule was not popular with the Swiss (called "Helvetes" back then.) So in 1332 Lucerne and three of its neighbors (Uri, Schwyz and Unterwalden) banded together to form the Helvetic Confederation (later known as Switzerland) and to free themselves from the Hapsburg yoke (see William Tell.)

These four original cantons of Switzerland were joined by Zurich, Zug, and Berne. Switzerland has now grown to 26 loosely federated states, but the original four forest cantons are considered the heart of Switzerland and have given their name to the lake that joins them, the Vierwaldstättersee or, in English, Lake Lucerne.

The City

We had flown from San Francisco to Frankfort, and after a long run-around at the Frankfort airport, we took a short flight to Zurich. Our guide met us and we took a bus to Lucerne. We were all pretty tired and jet-lagged, but cheered up when we were told that we had been upgraded to the Hotel Schweitzerhof right on the lakefront.

After settling in, we went out for an evening walk. The river Reuss, which drains the lake, runs through the center of the city. The mouth of the river was just a couple of blocks from our front door. We got our first view of the famous Kapellbrucke covered bridge, and beyond it, the Baroque facade of the Jesuit Church of Saint Francis Xavier.

The next morning we took a walking tour across the Kapellbrucke, into the Jesuit Church to see its marvelous Rococo interior, back across the Reuss, and through the old city with its painted buildings, both old and new. We visited the Lion Memorial, a tribute to the courage and faithfulness of the Swiss guards who gave their lives attempting to defend the French royal family when the revolutionary mob stormed the Tuileries in 1792. The final stop was the cathedral with its renaissance facade sandwiched between two much earlier towers. It has a graveyard reminiscent of The Sound of Music.

The Mountain

Just outside Lucerne, Mount Pilatus rises over a mile higher than the city. It is a popular tourist destination, so, being popular tourists, we took the round trip: Up Pilatus by gondola, down the other side on Europe's steepest cog railway, and back to Lucerne by boat.

The Lake